All the Pretty Horses vs The burning hills: Which Should You Read?
Both live on shelves: Cowboys, Ranch life, Westerns, Fiction
All the Pretty Horses
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All the Pretty Horses is a novel by American author Cormac McCarthy published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1992. Its romanticism (in contrast to the bleakness of McCarthy's earlier work) brought the writer much public…
The burning hills
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L'Amour's protagonist, Trace Jordan, makes a hard but honest living. Unscrupulous thugs kill his partner and steal his horses. But crime doesn't pay for the villains of this fast-paced western drama. Not only does…
Side by side
The verdict
- Ratings are close across the board — any is a safe pick by score.
- The burning hills is the quickest read — about 2 hours vs 5 for All the Pretty Horses.
- All the Pretty Horses has the widest readership — 696 ratings behind its score.
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Scores by source
| All the Pretty Horses | The burning hills | |
|---|---|---|
| Goodreads | 4.3 (358) | — |
| Hardcover | 4.0 (1) | 2.7 (3) |
| Google Books | 4.0 (16) | — |
| Apple Books | 4.5 (696) | 4.5 (148) |
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Reception
| All the Pretty Horses | The burning hills | |
|---|---|---|
| Ratings | 696 | 148 |
| Editions | 54 | 19 |
| Film adaptations | 1 | 1 |
| Want to read | 323 | — |
| Reading it now | 4 | — |
| Written reviews | 16 | — |
| Wikipedia attention | 18283 | 503 |
| Pages | 301 | 153 |
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Questions readers ask
Which is rated higher: All the Pretty Horses or The burning hills?
All the Pretty Horses has the higher combined reader rating across sources (All the Pretty Horses 4.4/5, The burning hills 4.4/5).
Which is shorter to read: All the Pretty Horses or The burning hills?
The burning hills is the quickest read. Estimated at 225 words per minute: The burning hills (153 pages, ≈ 2 h 50 m); All the Pretty Horses (301 pages, ≈ 5 h 34 m).
Which is harder to read: All the Pretty Horses or The burning hills?
Estimated difficulty, based on era, reader shelves and length — All the Pretty Horses: Moderate; The burning hills: Moderate.
Have both books been made into films?
All the Pretty Horses: 2 film adaptations; The burning hills: no film adaptation on record.